Best Resources

Best Resources for Youth Research

Understanding youth and how to connect with them is crucial to a faith community’s future. Studies have shown that churches with good youth ministries are vibrant and stable. It's important for church leaders to know their young parishioners and in doing so, implement programs that will have...

Prevailing culture often casts teenagers as alienated from religion, if not downright hostile to it. To believe some movie depictions, teenagers are rebellious Pagans-in-the-making, more interested in witchcraft than mission trips. But a four-year national study of youth and religion arrives at a different conclusion. The study, which included interviews with more than 3,000 U.S. teenagers, finds that a majority of today’s young people see religion as a positive influence on their lives and the lives of their community. Moreover, they have no desire to cast off the faith of their upbringing.